


The Multitude of Thy Mercies

by queenofthorns



Category: Henry IV Part 1 - Shakespeare, Richard II - Shakespeare, The Hollow Crown (2012)
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-13
Updated: 2013-12-13
Packaged: 2018-01-04 13:48:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1081739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofthorns/pseuds/queenofthorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fathers and sons, House of Lancaster style, complete with willful misunderstanding, and the ways people who love each other can be one another's "dearest enemies"</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Multitude of Thy Mercies

_Cast me not away from thy presence_

September 1398

You used to run up the spiral stairs to your father’s solar; now the climb is as arduous as scaling a mountain. You pause halfway, and lift your head to look out a narrow window. The last mellow rays of autumn sun turn the harvest’s stubble into undulating cloth of gold. Beyond the fields are glades of oak and ash, the crowns of the trees already blazing yellow and orange, though their leaves below are yet green. You will not see those leaves fall, nor the sowing of winter wheat.

Your earlier departures from England were by your own will, not another’s. You have ridden in tourneys in France, you have fought pagans in the damp grey bogs of Lithuania, you have beheld the shining walls of Jerusalem the Blessed and you have always known that you would return, whenever you wished, to your lands and your honors and your blood. 

_Ten years._ Your children scattered for ten years like sparrows among those of your kin brave enough, or greedy enough for their inheritance, to take them in. They will be grown when you return, and you will be an old man. _All by the will of my cousin._

You duck through the low door of the solar where your father and your eldest son await you. The boy frowns slightly when he sees you, for the news writ on your face cannot be good; his lips part, but he checks himself so that he may not speak before his grandfather. 

Your father is less observant than Harry. “Come,” he says, beckoning you toward the fire that warms the chill room. “You have won,” he says. “Mowbray is overthrown.”

You shake your head. “The _King_ has won,” you say. “Mowbray and I are both overthrown. Richard has banished us; I am exiled for ten years, and Mowbray for life.”

Your father sways, clutching Harry’s shoulder; you spring forward to take his weight, waving off Harry’s attempts to help. Once seated, your father leans back, his face as pale as milk and his breaths labored, as though merely to draw in air causes him pain. 

This man, the Duke of Lancaster, whom they call John of Gaunt, has always loomed immense, impregnable as one of his many castles, third son of a King, though in truth, he was King in all but name. Now, kneeling before him, you note his new profusion of white hair, the flecks of brown that dapple the skin of his bony hands.

“The King.” Your father’s mouth trembles as he says the word. “He is my brother’s son. I will plead with him. Perhaps your little girls will soften his heart; he is kind to children.”

“Do Gloucester’s sons think him kind for having their father smothered in his bed?” You accused Mowbray of your uncle’s murder in Calais and provoked a fateful test of honor, but it was the words you did not speak, the knowledge of who gave Mowbray his orders, that brought you into exile. 

A soft gasp from Harry makes you look up from your father, into your son’s startled eyes. He has been so still, as silent as the carven oak of your father’s great chair, that you had quite forgotten his presence. There are things you must speak of with your father, things your son has no business to hear.

“Go, Harry,” you say. “See to it that there are fresh horses saddled; I must ride forth again this night.” You have, of course, issued those commands already, but the activity will perhaps distract the boy from pondering your careless words too closely. “I will come down presently.”

The boy bows to you and to his grandfather. You watch him cross the room; he was much given to sickness when he was younger, but his long legs and straight back promise that he will be tall when he is grown, with all the advantages that height gives a warrior. They say your uncle, Richard’s father, whom you scarcely remember, towered over all those around him, at court and on the battlefield. It would be a sweet irony if your Harry were more like the Black Prince than his own son is.

Your father unwittingly dashes the hopes you have never spoken. “I fear,” he sighs, “that the boy will not be much of a fighter.”

Your eyes narrow. “What do you mean?” you say. “He is my son. My heir.”

“Oh, he is clever enough, and he could be skilled if he tried,” your father says. “Only ... he has not your joy in the practice of arms. Music, books, those are more to his liking, as though he would be a minstrel or a churchman.” He sighs. “He reminds me of Richard at that age. He too was well-indulged.”

“He is _my_ son,” you say firmly. “Not Richard’s. And he will be what he must be, because he is Henry Bolingbroke’s son.”

“That name will not be an easy one to bear,” your father says. “Not for a while. Not for any of your children.”

“Do you think I do not know it?” you ask. “I mean to leave Harry with you, sir, if you will have the raising of him.” If anyone can teach Harry to be worthy of his position, it is your father. Though a doubting voice reminds you that your father raised Richard too.

“Yes,” your father agrees. 

“The girls will go to their grandmother at Langham; Thomas, John and Humphrey will go to Tom.” Your half-brother cleaved to the King against the lords who would have curbed his power, you among them. You do not doubt that Tom will protect his kinsmen, though, and he and his wife enjoy the King’s favor, which will be as another shield for the boys.

Your father nods. “It is well done,” he says. 

“It is ill-done,” you disagree, “to part my children from each other and to part me from them for so long. But I have no other choice, thanks to the King.”

“You and Richard were friends once,” your father says mildly.

“And who broke that friendship?” you say, aggrieved that even now your father takes the King’s part. “It was not I who placed false friends in high places, and forgot all that was owed to you, for keeping England whole all these years.”

Your father sighs. “Oh, my son,” he says softly. “Too often crowns fall on heads too weak to bear them.” It is the closest your father has ever come to an open criticism of Richard before you. “But if he is flawed, then the fault is partly mine. I raised him. He is Edward’s son.” Even now, it is the shadow of his dead brother whom he sees in Richard, not the weak and living man.

Your father changes the subject. “Where will you go now?” he asks.

“Marienburg, perhaps,” you say. You still have friends amongst the German knights, and they still battle their enemies to the east. “Or Hungary.” Your friend Sigismund fights for his throne there, and would welcome you beside him.

Your father shakes his head. “No,” he says. “Do not go too far from England. Richard is ever changeable; if you do naught to anger him afresh, he may send for you in ten weeks or ten months. But if he sends for you and you cannot answer his summons, then he may decide he was mistaken. Stay close, my son.”

You are less sanguine than your father about the duration of your exile, but you have come to him for his advice, so it behooves you not to ignore it.

“France, then,” you say. “Or Burgundy.”

“Yes,” your father says. “Though I think you will find little favor at the French court while their daughter is Richard’s Queen. Stay in the north; news will come there swiftly from England.” 

Brittany is in the north, you think. The Duchess is a kind and gentle lady and very fair in her quiet way. That is a thought that lightens your heavy heart. 

There is one more matter to be settled. It is a dark thing to speak to a man of his own impending death; darker still when the man is your father. You do not know where to begin.

The silence stretches, until your father, whose perspicacity is legend, asks: “What will become of all this?” His outstretched arm encompasses this room, the castle beyond it, three quarters of a Kingdom and all the immense wealth that has accrued him through two fortunate marriages.

At least in this matter, your cousin has shown you the courtesy due a kinsman. “The King has sworn my inheritance will be safe,” you say. “If you should die before I return.” The words stick in your throat.

You bend down to embrace him; he holds your face within his hands, his fingers dry and thin as sticks, and kisses your cheeks. “Fare thee well, my Henry! I shall live to see thee prosper again.” 

At the door, you look back. A flame leaps up in the hearth; in the sudden light, you see the gleam of tears on your father’s cheek, and you know that he lied. You will not see him again, not until both you and he come before a Father more terrible and more merciful than any earthly King. For all his brave promise, he knows it too.

In the courtyard, solemn-faced Harry checks and rechecks the girths on your saddle with long, careful fingers, a duty he does though your father’s grooms have never been negligent.

“Come, Harry,” you say, beckoning. “Walk with me.”

He turns, and for an instant, you see his mother’s swift, sweet smile pass across his face. You put your arm around his thin shoulders, and draw him a little way from the men who wait for your departure. 

“I shall not see you again until you are a man grown,” you muse. “Your grandfather has charge of you for now; you must study to be a worthy heir to Lancaster.”

“My grandfather, sir?” Harry stops, your arm still heavy across his back. “I ... I thought I was to come with you.” His voice still has the bell-like clarity of childhood.

For a heartbeat, you are tempted by a vision of yourself and your eldest son, knights errant, paladins of your faith. You will show him all the wonders of the world, and he will be your shield and your buckler, your strong right arm when your own fails you. 

Then you remember your uncle Gloucester, smothered in his bed when he had been promised safety. The Lords Appellant are dead, save for you and treacherous Mowbray, and if and when the King’s assassins come for you, is it likely they will spare your heir?

“No,” you say. “It is not safe. You will stay here with your grandfather. That is my decision.” You lift your arm from Harry’s shoulders, and turn him so you may embrace him in farewell. 

Harry drops to a knee, catches your hand, and grips your fingers tightly. “Please, sir,” he chokes out. “I could be your squire. We could fight the Saracens ... like the Lionheart and Blondel.”

His words echo your earlier thoughts. The light of the torches wavers in your sight, and you scrub your sleeve across eyes until they smart. Henry Bolingbroke does not weep like a maiden on her wedding night, you tell yourself fiercely. It is anger and the desire for revenge that will fortify you in exile, not grief for your father or pity for your son’s boyish dreams. 

You have struggled to hold yourself in check since Richard pronounced his sentence at Gosford Green, but you know that, cousin or no, King or no, if Richard were here before you at this moment, you would smash your mailed fist into his face, again and again, until he lay limp and bleeding at your feet. But Richard is not here, only the boy at your feet, who looks up at you, eyes filled with such trust and love that you cannot bear their gaze another instant. All your rage bursts like a thundercloud over his innocent shoulders.

“What use are you to me?” you snap. “I have heard no reports of your valor, nor of your diligence. I need no such squire.” 

You pull your hand from his, more roughly than you intended, which sends him sprawling into the dirt. You hesitate, then bend, your hand hovering over his shoulder. _Too well-indulged_ , your father said. _Like Richard_. Every hurt smoothed away by willing hands to make a man who seeks only pleasure, turning his face from unpleasant duty. You straighten without touching the boy. 

A horse whinnies, and the captain of your father’s guard calls out. “My lord, we must go. There’s a storm coming.” 

You stride away and mount your horse in silence, amongst your silent men. Winches and chains groan as the drawbridge is lowered, and you turn to where Harry still lies in the muck. You watch as he scrabbles to his knees; there is a smear of something dark and wet on his cheek and his eyes are huge in his thin face. His lips move, but you cannot hear what he says. Instead, a voice speaks inside your own head: _He will remember this. He will remember that his father might have used him kindly, and did not._ No matter. The world is full of disappointment and betrayal by those we hold most dear; the sooner the boy learns that lesson, the less he will suffer.

**Author's Note:**

> I've always loved the troubled relationship between Henry IV and his son, Prince Hal, of Falstaffian fame, and, having read a bunch of novels that tell that story from Hal's perspective, I thought it might be interesting to imagine what his father thought.
> 
> Obviously, Shakespeare did it first and best, but he wasn't exactly faithful to the historical chronology (for example, Hotspur was Henry Bolingbroke's contemporary, not Hal's!) However, while I've tried as best I could to do my research and get the dates/names/etc. right, I'm sure there are mistakes, for which I apologize ahead of time.
> 
> I've called "Hal" "Harry" throughout this because that's what Henry calls him in the plays, so … there you go.


End file.
